BOSTON — Alex Cora brought his seven-year old twins, Xander and Isander, to the visitor’s side at Fenway Park to meet Yankees superstar Aaron Judge on Saturday afternoon. It was one of the few positive interactions Judge had with the Red Sox all weekend.
Judge struck out three more times Sunday against Brayan Bello and finished his three-day stay in Boston 1-for-12 with nine strikeouts. While he did tie Friday’s game with a monstrous, dramatic homer off Garrett Crochet in the ninth inning, Judge was neutralized throughout the Red Sox’ sweep. When he did put the ball in play Sunday, the outcome was even worse for him as he grounded into an inning-ending double play against Garrett Whitlock with two men on and one out in the eighth inning of a 2-0 game.
The series represented Judge’s first three-game span with eight or more strikeouts in 2025. The Red Sox were the second team ever to strike him out at least three times in three straight games, joining the 2018 Angels.
“Throughout the years, we’ve been aggressive with him,” Cora said. “Sometimes, he gets us. Sometimes, we do a good job with him. It’s always fun to compete against the best and for me, he’s the best in the business right now.”
On Friday, Crochet used a fastball-heavy approach against Judge to strike him out three times before Judge won their fourth battle with a 443-foot blast that cleared the Monster and tied the game before the Red Sox won in walk-off fashion an inning later. On Saturday, rookie Hunter Dobbins used off-speed weapons against the slugger. Sunday brought a varied attack by Bello, who got Judge to chase third strikes on a four-seamer, cutter and sinker. In six games dating back to last weekend’s series in the Bronx, the Red Sox punched Judge out 13 times (though he homered three times).
“It’s very hard,” said Cora. “We saw it last weekend, we’ve seen it throughout the season. He’s so good at what he does. But we used our fastballs in the right spots. We got some swings and misses.
“You have to execute. We did a good job with that. It’s one of those where it wasn’t his weekend against us, but he’s gonna be OK, he’s gonna find it again and we have to face him again in a few months.”
Like he did Friday, Judge had a big chance to bail out a scuffling Yankees offense Sunday afternoon. In a two-run game in the eighth inning, Brennan Bernardino allowed two singles to lead off the frame, then struck out Ben Rice to set the stage for Judge. Cora, wanting the right-on-right matchup, inserted Whitlock, who was his closer-for-the-day with Aroldis Chapman unavailable. Whitlock got Judge to chase a high sinker with the first pitch, then chase an outside slider that he chopped to third.
Abraham Toro fielded the ball cleanly and threw to second base where David Hamilton was waiting to finish off a clutch 5-4-3 double play that all but sealed a Red Sox victory (and weep)
“Right there, just trying to force a ground ball and let the boys do what they do,” said Whitlock. “That’s exactly what they did.
“Toro made a great play on it, made a great feed to Hammy, then Hammy with the quick hands getting it over to first, it was an amazing defensive job right there.”
Judge, hitting .378 with 26 homers, 60 RBIs and a 1.229 OPS in 70 games this season, will surely get his chances to beat the Red Sox again. On this June weekend, though, Boston got the best of him.
“He’s one of the greatest hitters in the world,” Whitlock said. “It’s special to watch him play and everything. Luckily, we tried to execute and had some execution this weekend. We’ll take it.”
